Chile launched a hepatitis and tetanus vaccination campaign on March 5 and doctors warned of outbreaks of diarrhea and infection among thousands of people displaced by the earthquake and the tsunami that heavily damaged or destroyed 36 hospitals and made garbage dumps of coastal towns and cities.

Thousands of Iraqis living abroad lined up at polling stations to cast ballots in their homeland's crucial parliamentary elections on March 5, a constituency Iraq's Sunni Arab minority hope will boost their showing.

At least 12 people were killed and 25 injured in a suicide bomb attack in the Hangu district of north-west Pakistan on March 5.

China expects its economy to grow around 8 percent in 2010, said Premier Wen Jiabao at China’s annual parliament session on Friday, anticipating a ‘crucial but complicated’ year for economic recovery.

The death toll in Chile was revised downward on March 4 as authorities reviewed discrepancies in the reported number of dead in the Maule region.

The US’s Congressional Democrats made headway on March 4 on their top legislative priority -- job creation -- when the House of Representatives approved a US$15 billion package of tax credits and highway construction.

An earthquake measuring preliminarily at magnitude 6.4 shook Taiwan on March 4, but there were no immediate reports of casualties or damage, officials said.

US President Barack Obama has told the US Congress to vote by simple majority on healthcare reform, saying Congress should "finish its work" and vote on the legislation in the next few weeks.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai must take ‘significant steps’ to fight corruption, the US military's top officer said on March 3, suggesting Washington was concerned that inaction could undercut the campaign against the Taliban.

Three suicide attacks, including one by a bomber who rode in an ambulance to hospital before blowing himself up, took the lives of 33 people in central Iraq on March 3, just days before nationwide polls.